Fate Has A Way
Disclaimer: Do I really have to say it again? Oh well, if I must. I don't own them. There? Are you happy now?
I'm listening to my Dvorak CD right now, and it makes me happy so I thought I'd start this while I was in a good mood. Thanks for the reviews on the last chapters because then I know that people are actually reading this and I'm not just wasting my time, as if I'd be doing something productive like testing my sig (LOL all of you who know what I'm talking about)… Anyways, here goes nothing.
~*******~
Chapter Two: Head Over Heels
"Daddy?" Amanda asked.
"Yes Peanut?"
"Where are you going?"
"I'm going to dinner with Monica," he tried to explain his date to his daughter. "You remember her, right? She was the nice doctor that we met last week."
"Oh yeah. I liked her." She pauses and thinks about something for a minute, "Daddy, when Uncle Joey goes out to dinner with a girl, she always spends the night with him. Is Monica going to spend the night here?"
"I don't think so honey. Not for a long time," he told her, as he thought to himself, 'Oh boy, this dating thing is going to be harder than I thought.' He hadn't been on a date since Amanda was born, and he had already gotten pep talks from Ross and Joey. Although, he didn't really listen to either of them since Joey was just encouraging him to have sex and Ross had hardly been on two or three dates since Carol left him. But it was still nice to know that they cared. And Chandler was really excited about this date. He didn't know why, but he had a good feeling about this, better than he had when he started going out with Amy. When he had called Monica on Monday, they had talked for an hour and had only stopped because Amanda had a nightmare and was crying for him. He told her that he was going to take her to a fancy restaurant and he couldn't wait to see her all dressed up. He hoped Joey would show up soon (he was babysitting Amanda) because he wanted to get Monica flowers before he picked her up at her apartment. To his relief, Joey arrived and was only two minutes late. He grabbed his jacket because it was January, and he found the nearest street vender selling flowers.
*******
Meanwhile, Rachel was helping Monica get ready for her date. Phoebe had gone on a date with Kip, and they had left an hour ago. Monica had advised Phoebe not to go on this date because she had never seen him last for two weeks with a girlfriend without cheating on her. But Phoebe wouldn't hear of it; she said that Monica was just jealous because Kip had asked her out and not Monica. Phoebe, however, couldn't have been further from the truth if she had tried. Kip had asked Monica out more than once, the last time he had done so was actually just after they had returned from Philadelphia. Monica wanted to tell her, but she didn't have the heart to. Maybe Kip wasn't as bad as she had originally thought. 'God, I hope so,' she thought. She allowed her thoughts to drift back to Chandler. She hadn't been this excited about a date in ages. And he said he was taking her to a nice restaurant. She had no idea what she should wear.
"I think you should wear the red one that you wore to the Christmas party," Rachel was saying. "The one with the beadwork on the bottom." Rachel was happy that Monica was finally going on dates again. It had been months since Pete, and Monica had been working a lot lately since it was cold and flu season. Rachel helped Monica fix her hair and put on her makeup, and she left a few minutes before Chandler was supposed to pick Monica up. After all, it was Friday night and she had a date too. On her way across the street to her own apartment, she saw a nice looking man in a suit heading in the direction from which she was coming carrying flowers. 'Wouldn't it be great if this Chandler was as nice as that guy looks?' Rachel thought. 'It's about time that nice guys started showing up in the New York area.'
*******
Chandler shifted anxiously as the door to apartment 20 opened. He gasped in awe as she appeared in the doorway. There were no words that could possibly describe how beautiful she looked, but he was going to have to try. "You look-" he tried to find a word, any word, to fill in the blank. "Amazing." It would have to do.
"You don't look so bad yourself," she grinned. She couldn't explain it- it was something about the way he looked at her- that made her feel as though this was going to turn out differently. He handed her the bouquet of roses that he had bought her on the way over. "They're beautiful." She exclaimed, and her face lit up. She put them in a vase and placed the bouquet on her kitchen table.
"Shall we?" He held out his arm and she linked her arm in his as they walked out the door together.
*******
Chandler took Monica to a small Italian restaurant that had a great reputation. He had been there a few times before at company dinners and other work-related social functions. The food was excellent there; however, Monica and Chandler were too busy to even notice.
They talked about anything and everything from friends and childhood memories to family and their jobs. Chandler had been working as a data processor until Amy divorced him to become a lesbian. He told Monica that when Amanda was born, he didn't want to leave her with a babysitter full time because his own parents had neglected him when he was a child. So he used some of the money that he got out of the divorce and some of the money that his dad had left him when he died of AIDS to buy a small, failing computer company and turn it around. The company now sells software to small businesses and was doing really well.
Monica told him all about going to Philadelphia to see baby James, and she tried to explain her family to him. However, since Chandler was an only child, he had a hard time keeping track of all of her different siblings. They talked for hours, only leaving the restaurant when it was closing for the night. When they arrived back at the front door to Monica's apartment, both of them were disappointed that the evening had to end.
"You don't mind if I call you?" Chandler said nervously.
"Absolutely not," she grinned at him. She really wanted him to kiss her, but knew that he was too much of a gentleman to do that on a first date.
"Goodnight Monica," he said. And he leaned in and kissed her cheek lightly. It was sudden and unexpected, and she wondered for a second if it had happened at all.
"Goodnight," she said as she opened the door and stepped into her apartment. She closed the door behind herself, leaned back against it, and smiled, fingering her cheek where his lips had just been.
Chandler watched the door close behind her. He was ecstatic.
*******
"So he's really coming?" Rachel asked excitedly on Sunday just over one week later. She and Phoebe had been anxious to see if this guy was really up-to-snuff. Monica was completely crazy about this guy and they had only been out twice.
"Wow, this is so great!" Phoebe was just as excited as Rachel to finally meet this Chandler guy that Monica had been going on non-stop about all week. "I have Kip and Monica has Chandler and Rachel has…" she trails off and thinks for a second. "Well, two out of three isn't bad."
"So what are we having for dinner Monica?" Rachel changed the subject as quickly as she could.
"Well, I decided on spaghetti because Chandler is bringing Amanda and his friend Ross who is bringing his four year old son Ben. Plus Joey, who would be over here to eat even if Chandler and I hadn't suggested that he come."
"It's too bad that Kip couldn't come Phoebes," Rachel added, though her statement was not entirely truthful. Like Monica, she too was worried that Kip would treat Phoebe like dirt and cheat on her, just like he had with all of the other girlfriends that they had ever seen him with.
"Yeah, but he said that he absolutely had to work this weekend." Phoebe paused and then went on. "And he said it would be completely worth the wait later, if you know what I mean…" She giggled.
"Phoebes, we always know what you mean." Monica said. "And be careful with him. We just don't want to see you get hurt."
"I know what you mean. Life's tough. I remember when I first came to this city. I was fourteen. My mom had just killed herself and my step-dad was back in prison, and I got here, and I didn't know anybody. And I ended up living with this albino guy who was, like, cleaning windshields outside port authority, and then he killed himself, and then I found aromatherapy. So believe me, I know exactly what you're talking about. And I can watch out for myself, thank you."
"The word you're looking for here is 'Anyway'…" Monica said, grateful that there was a knock on the door at that very second.
When Monica opened the door, Amanda gasped. "It's purple, Daddy!" She exclaimed.
"You like it, Manda?" Monica asked; she didn't need to. Amanda nodded energetically. "This is my friend Rachel and my friend Phoebe. Guys, this is Chandler and Amanda." Rachel remembered Chandler as the guy she had seen on her way home last weekend. 'No wonder Monica's crazy about him,' she thought.
As if on cue, Ross and Ben made their grand entrance the next minute, and they were followed immediately by Joey.
*******
Dinner had gone well. Chandler and Monica both agreed on that. It was about 7:00 that night, and everyone else had returned to their own apartments. Chandler had volunteered to stay behind and help Monica do the dishes, which they had just finished. Amanda was sitting on Monica's sofa watching The Little Mermaid because it was the only movie Monica had that was "child-friendly."
"Amanda, sweetheart, we have to go home now and get ready for bed."
"But Daddy," she started to whine. "Why can't we just stay here at Monica's?"
"Amanda, your pajamas are at home and so is Mr. Bear. You wouldn't want to go to sleep without them would you?"
"Then can Monica come home with us?"
"Peanut, she has to get up and go to work tomorrow morning. But how about this? What if Monica helped me tell your bedtime story?" He looked pleadingly (is that a word, oh well, you know what I'm trying to say…lol) at Monica, desperately trying to compromise.
"Yeah, you give us something to start with and we'll tell you a story together." Monica quickly agreed.
"Okay!" Amanda seemed to be satisfied with the arrangement. "Once upon a time…" she started. She pointed to Monica. "Now you go."
"There was a fairy princess who lived in a faraway land-"
"What's her name Daddy?" Amanda interrupted.
"Ummm… Goldilocks?"
"Wow, Chandler. You really need to touch up on your fairy tales." Monica laughed.
"Shut up," he tried to push her off of the sofa but she stopped him before he could. "You're freakishly strong, you know that? Anyway, on with the story. So Princess Goldilocks was walking along in her kingdom one day when she saw this big bad wolf blowing down the houses of each of the three bears. So she found a frog who could help her stop the big bad wolf from destroying the village. After the frog so valiantly helped Princess Goldilocks, they went into the forest, where they met Little Red Riding Hood who had just been at the three little pigs' house. When they got into the heart of the forest, the princess wanted to reward the frog for all of its help. So the frog asked her to kiss him, which she did. The frog turned into a prince and found Cinderella to rescue her from the curse of the poisoned apple. The three of them found a horse a rode off to the ball, where everyone was celebrating the fact that Snow White's foot had fit into the glass slipper. And everyone lived happily ever after. The end."
"No monsters and no ghosts, but that story was very scary." (A/N: Anyone else get the Full House reference?). "Please tell me that all of his stories aren't like this Amanda?" She shakes her head. "Thank God. How about I tell you a real fairy tale, and this time Chandler, leave all of the details to me…"
*******
Skipping about three weeks' time
It was Valentine's Day, and Chandler and Monica had been going out for just over one month. To Monica and Rachel's surprise, so had Phoebe and Kip. Things seemed to be going really well for both couples. Monica, Rachel, Phoebe, Chandler, Joey, and Ross had become almost inseparable, and Ben and Amanda loved all six of them very much already (even though they obviously already knew the three guys). Ross' parents were watching Ben and Amanda (A/N: Yes, I'm not going to ignore that fact forever, but it's gonna be longer in coming than you might think.) for the evening, since all six of them had dates. Monica and Chandler were going to dinner. Phoebe and Kip had plans. Ross had a date with some British girl he met in Central Park named Emily. Rachel was going out with a guy that someone from work set her up with. And Joey had three dates for the evening, in no particular order.
Chandler stopped by Monica's apartment at about 4:30 since he got off of work early and Amanda was already with Jack and Judy Geller. He knew that she would probably be home because she had the whole afternoon off since she had been on call the night before. He had a key to her apartment and let himself in, laying the flowers that he had bought her as a prelude to that night down on her kitchen table. "Monica?" He called.
"I'm in here." Her voice was coming from the extra bedroom. Thinking about it, Chandler couldn't remember ever having been in her extra bedroom. He cracked the door open and poked his head through the door. This hardly resembled a bedroom at all. There were a couple of easels throughout the room, and Monica was standing behind one with her hair pulled back in a ponytail and a paintbrush in her hand, staring intently at it and comparing it to a picture that she had clipped next to the easel. All around the walls there were paintings of people, animals, sailboats, houses, and just about anything else that you could imagine.
"Did you do everything that's up here?" Chandler asked in amazement.
"Yea, this is just some of the stuff that I've kept for myself. The ones that I really love are up in my gallery at my parents' house in Boston. And I've sold a whole bunch of stuff or donated it to charities."
"You really are incredible," he said to her. He walked up behind her, wrapped his arms around her, and kissed the top of her head.
"You're gonna get paint on yourself," she said, turning around to face him.
"I don't care," he said as he leaned in to kiss her. "What's this a painting of?" He motioned towards the easel.
"Oh this," she said, hesitating for a second. The painting was of a huge house, and it looked really elegant, like one of the homes that a really rich person would own. "Well, it's this house that's in Boston. And it was featured in a decorating magazine. I remember this house from when I was growing up in Boston, so I decided to paint it." She paused; then she asked, "Why are you here early? This is definitely not my best fashion statement." She motioned to her jeans and her old t-shirt, both of which were covered in paint stains.
"I got off of work early. You're cute when you're embarrassed," he said, and she blushed slightly.
"Can I get you anything?" She asked. "I was gonna make myself some coffee."
"Sounds good, we've still got two hours before we have to leave for dinner." They left the painting/bedroom, and Monica started the coffee. When it was ready, they sat on the sofa and talked. It was when Monica looked up that she noticed.
"Look Chandler," she gasped, and in her excitement, she sounded much like a child. "It's snowing!" They got up and went to the window to watch the snow fall. "I remember once, when I was growing up, it started snowing on Christmas Eve. I must have been just barely five at the time because I had just been officially adopted. Phillip and Becky were both asleep, but I couldn't close my eyes. My dad used to call me his little snow angel because I was always the first one to be outside when it would snow. He knew that I wouldn't be asleep, so he came to my room and took me for a walk. He took me to this lake that we would go skating on. It was so beautiful there. Then he went over to this big tree and he pulled out this bracelet. He said that the fairy princesses had left it there for me. It was when my dad put that bracelet on my wrist that I really knew that I belonged." Monica's eyes sparkled as she told Chandler the story. Monica lifted up her wrist, revealing the bracelet, and smiled. "I hardly ever take it off."
Chandler kissed her temple. "You are truly the most amazing woman that I have ever met." He paused, but only long enough to make sure that she was really listening. "And I love you."
"I love you too Chandler." It was as if time stood still, as if everything had stopped just for them. In that moment, nothing mattered but the two of them. And if they could have, they would have stayed there forever.
~*******~
I'm gonna stop it there for now. I would have put more in this chapter, but it's main purpose is to be a filler between them meeting and whatever I decide is gonna happen next. Plus I have a very important Model UN conference to go to this weekend (nobody better be laughing at me, model un is actually pretty fun) and I wanted to get this finished and posted before everyone forgot about it… I know this one was a little boring and probably pretty sappy and that it skipped around a lot, but it should get better as I get into some of the more interesting stuff. Please review and/or email me to tell me what you thought, what I could do better, or what you think should happen. Thanks a bunch ~Auds
Oh yeah, one more thing: that conversation that Phoebe had about when she moved to the city was pulled from the pilot episode of the show, and I don't own it so please don't sue me. Same thing goes for the quote from Full House and the idea about telling really weird fairy tales (my four year old sister is really into that show, and I watch it with her sometimes…). So I don't own that either.
Disclaimer: Do I really have to say it again? Oh well, if I must. I don't own them. There? Are you happy now?
I'm listening to my Dvorak CD right now, and it makes me happy so I thought I'd start this while I was in a good mood. Thanks for the reviews on the last chapters because then I know that people are actually reading this and I'm not just wasting my time, as if I'd be doing something productive like testing my sig (LOL all of you who know what I'm talking about)… Anyways, here goes nothing.
~*******~
Chapter Two: Head Over Heels
"Daddy?" Amanda asked.
"Yes Peanut?"
"Where are you going?"
"I'm going to dinner with Monica," he tried to explain his date to his daughter. "You remember her, right? She was the nice doctor that we met last week."
"Oh yeah. I liked her." She pauses and thinks about something for a minute, "Daddy, when Uncle Joey goes out to dinner with a girl, she always spends the night with him. Is Monica going to spend the night here?"
"I don't think so honey. Not for a long time," he told her, as he thought to himself, 'Oh boy, this dating thing is going to be harder than I thought.' He hadn't been on a date since Amanda was born, and he had already gotten pep talks from Ross and Joey. Although, he didn't really listen to either of them since Joey was just encouraging him to have sex and Ross had hardly been on two or three dates since Carol left him. But it was still nice to know that they cared. And Chandler was really excited about this date. He didn't know why, but he had a good feeling about this, better than he had when he started going out with Amy. When he had called Monica on Monday, they had talked for an hour and had only stopped because Amanda had a nightmare and was crying for him. He told her that he was going to take her to a fancy restaurant and he couldn't wait to see her all dressed up. He hoped Joey would show up soon (he was babysitting Amanda) because he wanted to get Monica flowers before he picked her up at her apartment. To his relief, Joey arrived and was only two minutes late. He grabbed his jacket because it was January, and he found the nearest street vender selling flowers.
*******
Meanwhile, Rachel was helping Monica get ready for her date. Phoebe had gone on a date with Kip, and they had left an hour ago. Monica had advised Phoebe not to go on this date because she had never seen him last for two weeks with a girlfriend without cheating on her. But Phoebe wouldn't hear of it; she said that Monica was just jealous because Kip had asked her out and not Monica. Phoebe, however, couldn't have been further from the truth if she had tried. Kip had asked Monica out more than once, the last time he had done so was actually just after they had returned from Philadelphia. Monica wanted to tell her, but she didn't have the heart to. Maybe Kip wasn't as bad as she had originally thought. 'God, I hope so,' she thought. She allowed her thoughts to drift back to Chandler. She hadn't been this excited about a date in ages. And he said he was taking her to a nice restaurant. She had no idea what she should wear.
"I think you should wear the red one that you wore to the Christmas party," Rachel was saying. "The one with the beadwork on the bottom." Rachel was happy that Monica was finally going on dates again. It had been months since Pete, and Monica had been working a lot lately since it was cold and flu season. Rachel helped Monica fix her hair and put on her makeup, and she left a few minutes before Chandler was supposed to pick Monica up. After all, it was Friday night and she had a date too. On her way across the street to her own apartment, she saw a nice looking man in a suit heading in the direction from which she was coming carrying flowers. 'Wouldn't it be great if this Chandler was as nice as that guy looks?' Rachel thought. 'It's about time that nice guys started showing up in the New York area.'
*******
Chandler shifted anxiously as the door to apartment 20 opened. He gasped in awe as she appeared in the doorway. There were no words that could possibly describe how beautiful she looked, but he was going to have to try. "You look-" he tried to find a word, any word, to fill in the blank. "Amazing." It would have to do.
"You don't look so bad yourself," she grinned. She couldn't explain it- it was something about the way he looked at her- that made her feel as though this was going to turn out differently. He handed her the bouquet of roses that he had bought her on the way over. "They're beautiful." She exclaimed, and her face lit up. She put them in a vase and placed the bouquet on her kitchen table.
"Shall we?" He held out his arm and she linked her arm in his as they walked out the door together.
*******
Chandler took Monica to a small Italian restaurant that had a great reputation. He had been there a few times before at company dinners and other work-related social functions. The food was excellent there; however, Monica and Chandler were too busy to even notice.
They talked about anything and everything from friends and childhood memories to family and their jobs. Chandler had been working as a data processor until Amy divorced him to become a lesbian. He told Monica that when Amanda was born, he didn't want to leave her with a babysitter full time because his own parents had neglected him when he was a child. So he used some of the money that he got out of the divorce and some of the money that his dad had left him when he died of AIDS to buy a small, failing computer company and turn it around. The company now sells software to small businesses and was doing really well.
Monica told him all about going to Philadelphia to see baby James, and she tried to explain her family to him. However, since Chandler was an only child, he had a hard time keeping track of all of her different siblings. They talked for hours, only leaving the restaurant when it was closing for the night. When they arrived back at the front door to Monica's apartment, both of them were disappointed that the evening had to end.
"You don't mind if I call you?" Chandler said nervously.
"Absolutely not," she grinned at him. She really wanted him to kiss her, but knew that he was too much of a gentleman to do that on a first date.
"Goodnight Monica," he said. And he leaned in and kissed her cheek lightly. It was sudden and unexpected, and she wondered for a second if it had happened at all.
"Goodnight," she said as she opened the door and stepped into her apartment. She closed the door behind herself, leaned back against it, and smiled, fingering her cheek where his lips had just been.
Chandler watched the door close behind her. He was ecstatic.
*******
"So he's really coming?" Rachel asked excitedly on Sunday just over one week later. She and Phoebe had been anxious to see if this guy was really up-to-snuff. Monica was completely crazy about this guy and they had only been out twice.
"Wow, this is so great!" Phoebe was just as excited as Rachel to finally meet this Chandler guy that Monica had been going on non-stop about all week. "I have Kip and Monica has Chandler and Rachel has…" she trails off and thinks for a second. "Well, two out of three isn't bad."
"So what are we having for dinner Monica?" Rachel changed the subject as quickly as she could.
"Well, I decided on spaghetti because Chandler is bringing Amanda and his friend Ross who is bringing his four year old son Ben. Plus Joey, who would be over here to eat even if Chandler and I hadn't suggested that he come."
"It's too bad that Kip couldn't come Phoebes," Rachel added, though her statement was not entirely truthful. Like Monica, she too was worried that Kip would treat Phoebe like dirt and cheat on her, just like he had with all of the other girlfriends that they had ever seen him with.
"Yeah, but he said that he absolutely had to work this weekend." Phoebe paused and then went on. "And he said it would be completely worth the wait later, if you know what I mean…" She giggled.
"Phoebes, we always know what you mean." Monica said. "And be careful with him. We just don't want to see you get hurt."
"I know what you mean. Life's tough. I remember when I first came to this city. I was fourteen. My mom had just killed herself and my step-dad was back in prison, and I got here, and I didn't know anybody. And I ended up living with this albino guy who was, like, cleaning windshields outside port authority, and then he killed himself, and then I found aromatherapy. So believe me, I know exactly what you're talking about. And I can watch out for myself, thank you."
"The word you're looking for here is 'Anyway'…" Monica said, grateful that there was a knock on the door at that very second.
When Monica opened the door, Amanda gasped. "It's purple, Daddy!" She exclaimed.
"You like it, Manda?" Monica asked; she didn't need to. Amanda nodded energetically. "This is my friend Rachel and my friend Phoebe. Guys, this is Chandler and Amanda." Rachel remembered Chandler as the guy she had seen on her way home last weekend. 'No wonder Monica's crazy about him,' she thought.
As if on cue, Ross and Ben made their grand entrance the next minute, and they were followed immediately by Joey.
*******
Dinner had gone well. Chandler and Monica both agreed on that. It was about 7:00 that night, and everyone else had returned to their own apartments. Chandler had volunteered to stay behind and help Monica do the dishes, which they had just finished. Amanda was sitting on Monica's sofa watching The Little Mermaid because it was the only movie Monica had that was "child-friendly."
"Amanda, sweetheart, we have to go home now and get ready for bed."
"But Daddy," she started to whine. "Why can't we just stay here at Monica's?"
"Amanda, your pajamas are at home and so is Mr. Bear. You wouldn't want to go to sleep without them would you?"
"Then can Monica come home with us?"
"Peanut, she has to get up and go to work tomorrow morning. But how about this? What if Monica helped me tell your bedtime story?" He looked pleadingly (is that a word, oh well, you know what I'm trying to say…lol) at Monica, desperately trying to compromise.
"Yeah, you give us something to start with and we'll tell you a story together." Monica quickly agreed.
"Okay!" Amanda seemed to be satisfied with the arrangement. "Once upon a time…" she started. She pointed to Monica. "Now you go."
"There was a fairy princess who lived in a faraway land-"
"What's her name Daddy?" Amanda interrupted.
"Ummm… Goldilocks?"
"Wow, Chandler. You really need to touch up on your fairy tales." Monica laughed.
"Shut up," he tried to push her off of the sofa but she stopped him before he could. "You're freakishly strong, you know that? Anyway, on with the story. So Princess Goldilocks was walking along in her kingdom one day when she saw this big bad wolf blowing down the houses of each of the three bears. So she found a frog who could help her stop the big bad wolf from destroying the village. After the frog so valiantly helped Princess Goldilocks, they went into the forest, where they met Little Red Riding Hood who had just been at the three little pigs' house. When they got into the heart of the forest, the princess wanted to reward the frog for all of its help. So the frog asked her to kiss him, which she did. The frog turned into a prince and found Cinderella to rescue her from the curse of the poisoned apple. The three of them found a horse a rode off to the ball, where everyone was celebrating the fact that Snow White's foot had fit into the glass slipper. And everyone lived happily ever after. The end."
"No monsters and no ghosts, but that story was very scary." (A/N: Anyone else get the Full House reference?). "Please tell me that all of his stories aren't like this Amanda?" She shakes her head. "Thank God. How about I tell you a real fairy tale, and this time Chandler, leave all of the details to me…"
*******
Skipping about three weeks' time
It was Valentine's Day, and Chandler and Monica had been going out for just over one month. To Monica and Rachel's surprise, so had Phoebe and Kip. Things seemed to be going really well for both couples. Monica, Rachel, Phoebe, Chandler, Joey, and Ross had become almost inseparable, and Ben and Amanda loved all six of them very much already (even though they obviously already knew the three guys). Ross' parents were watching Ben and Amanda (A/N: Yes, I'm not going to ignore that fact forever, but it's gonna be longer in coming than you might think.) for the evening, since all six of them had dates. Monica and Chandler were going to dinner. Phoebe and Kip had plans. Ross had a date with some British girl he met in Central Park named Emily. Rachel was going out with a guy that someone from work set her up with. And Joey had three dates for the evening, in no particular order.
Chandler stopped by Monica's apartment at about 4:30 since he got off of work early and Amanda was already with Jack and Judy Geller. He knew that she would probably be home because she had the whole afternoon off since she had been on call the night before. He had a key to her apartment and let himself in, laying the flowers that he had bought her as a prelude to that night down on her kitchen table. "Monica?" He called.
"I'm in here." Her voice was coming from the extra bedroom. Thinking about it, Chandler couldn't remember ever having been in her extra bedroom. He cracked the door open and poked his head through the door. This hardly resembled a bedroom at all. There were a couple of easels throughout the room, and Monica was standing behind one with her hair pulled back in a ponytail and a paintbrush in her hand, staring intently at it and comparing it to a picture that she had clipped next to the easel. All around the walls there were paintings of people, animals, sailboats, houses, and just about anything else that you could imagine.
"Did you do everything that's up here?" Chandler asked in amazement.
"Yea, this is just some of the stuff that I've kept for myself. The ones that I really love are up in my gallery at my parents' house in Boston. And I've sold a whole bunch of stuff or donated it to charities."
"You really are incredible," he said to her. He walked up behind her, wrapped his arms around her, and kissed the top of her head.
"You're gonna get paint on yourself," she said, turning around to face him.
"I don't care," he said as he leaned in to kiss her. "What's this a painting of?" He motioned towards the easel.
"Oh this," she said, hesitating for a second. The painting was of a huge house, and it looked really elegant, like one of the homes that a really rich person would own. "Well, it's this house that's in Boston. And it was featured in a decorating magazine. I remember this house from when I was growing up in Boston, so I decided to paint it." She paused; then she asked, "Why are you here early? This is definitely not my best fashion statement." She motioned to her jeans and her old t-shirt, both of which were covered in paint stains.
"I got off of work early. You're cute when you're embarrassed," he said, and she blushed slightly.
"Can I get you anything?" She asked. "I was gonna make myself some coffee."
"Sounds good, we've still got two hours before we have to leave for dinner." They left the painting/bedroom, and Monica started the coffee. When it was ready, they sat on the sofa and talked. It was when Monica looked up that she noticed.
"Look Chandler," she gasped, and in her excitement, she sounded much like a child. "It's snowing!" They got up and went to the window to watch the snow fall. "I remember once, when I was growing up, it started snowing on Christmas Eve. I must have been just barely five at the time because I had just been officially adopted. Phillip and Becky were both asleep, but I couldn't close my eyes. My dad used to call me his little snow angel because I was always the first one to be outside when it would snow. He knew that I wouldn't be asleep, so he came to my room and took me for a walk. He took me to this lake that we would go skating on. It was so beautiful there. Then he went over to this big tree and he pulled out this bracelet. He said that the fairy princesses had left it there for me. It was when my dad put that bracelet on my wrist that I really knew that I belonged." Monica's eyes sparkled as she told Chandler the story. Monica lifted up her wrist, revealing the bracelet, and smiled. "I hardly ever take it off."
Chandler kissed her temple. "You are truly the most amazing woman that I have ever met." He paused, but only long enough to make sure that she was really listening. "And I love you."
"I love you too Chandler." It was as if time stood still, as if everything had stopped just for them. In that moment, nothing mattered but the two of them. And if they could have, they would have stayed there forever.
~*******~
I'm gonna stop it there for now. I would have put more in this chapter, but it's main purpose is to be a filler between them meeting and whatever I decide is gonna happen next. Plus I have a very important Model UN conference to go to this weekend (nobody better be laughing at me, model un is actually pretty fun) and I wanted to get this finished and posted before everyone forgot about it… I know this one was a little boring and probably pretty sappy and that it skipped around a lot, but it should get better as I get into some of the more interesting stuff. Please review and/or email me to tell me what you thought, what I could do better, or what you think should happen. Thanks a bunch ~Auds
Oh yeah, one more thing: that conversation that Phoebe had about when she moved to the city was pulled from the pilot episode of the show, and I don't own it so please don't sue me. Same thing goes for the quote from Full House and the idea about telling really weird fairy tales (my four year old sister is really into that show, and I watch it with her sometimes…). So I don't own that either.